Just twenty years later, on one August day in the year of grace 1346, Master John Copeland -- as men now called the Brabant page, now secretary to the Queen of England -- brought his mistress the unhandsome tidings that David Bruce had invaded her realm with forty thousand Scots to back him.

Anthony à Wood quaintly tells us that "after her decease he left the nation for religion sake, and settled at Mechlin in Brabant, which is a wonder to some who will allow no religion in poets, that this person should above all of his profession be a voluntary exile, for it".

The well-informed part of the Dutch people had already acknowledged their indifference to the loss of Brabant, which is connected with France rather than with Holland, and interspersed with expensive fortresses; it might have been advantageously exchanged for the northern provinces.

The efforts of the French kings, while unable to crush Flemish independence, succeeded, nevertheless, in checking the power of the counts, while other States, such as Brabant, were allowed to develop more freely beyond the